Does your business need an integrator, a coo (or a PM)?

Deep Thoughts, Operations, Project Management

“Do I need a PM, or an Integrator?” “Our ops need to be streamlined, so I think I need to hire a project manager…” “Wait…can you tell me what the difference is between COO, Integrator and Project Manager? — When do I need which?” Yes I can! And I get asked...

Bottleneck #4: The CEO Bottleneck

Leadership, Operations

  This last bottleneck was the most popular of the talk.  Literally every business owner in the room had their hands up, as a confession that they themselves were a bottleneck (even the main bottleneck) in their business.   Here’s how CEO bottlenecks tend to...

Bottleneck #3: You’re Missing a Kitchen Manager

Operations, Leadership

Tell me if this sounds familiar: You, as a CEO have a great idea — a new project, something you want to do — and you bring it up to the team, you have some discussion…and it fizzles out and somehow you end up doing things the same old way you’ve always done. Or,...

Bottleneck #2: The Team Member Bottleneck

Deep Thoughts, Operations

The 2nd bottleneck I want to talk about is a team member bottleneck. Many of us are all too familiar with this one. What does a team-member bottleneck look like in your business? Here’s 3 common ways that it appears: 1. You have a team member who is just not reliable....

Bottleneck #1: The Tech Bottleneck

Deep Thoughts, Operations

Back in March I spoke at Todd Herman’s 90 Day Year Live event in La Jolla, CA on Breaking the 4 Bottlenecks That’ll Keep You From Scaling Your Business. This blog series is drawn from that talk. Business owners usually call me pretty much when they reach a crunch...

Is the “press of business” holding your business back?

Deep Thoughts, Operations

Remember how it used to feel to land customers? (A little like this?) Those were heady days. But these days…it’s a little different: “This sounds crazy to say, but if we take in even more more premium client, I think my team will implode.” “From the client side, it...